I Can’t Run Away From the Girl Who Saved Me

82 – Mask (1)

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Tok, tok,

The sound of raindrops lightly hitting the blades of grass seemed to be falling one by one, but soon it started pouring down like a torrent.

I suddenly raised my head to the sound of rain pounding ceaselessly on the roof of a small wooden house built next to the lake.

Raindrops were leaking from the ceiling.

With a familiar movement, I pushed a large bowl made of clay with my foot into the spot where raindrops collected.

This was something I had already experienced several times.

“Whoever built it is a terrible house.”

I sighed, spitting out accusations that no one would listen to.

Of course, my criticism doesn’t hurt anyone.

Because I was the one who built this house.

“There is a reason why Malis is called a wise man.”

I scratched the back of my head and muttered quietly to myself.

Malis was a great sage and great wizard about two hundred years ago.

He was a famous historical figure with an anecdote about building a huge castle in one day.

According to the green woman, he was a spiritist like me.

To be honest, building a castle in one day would be entirely possible with the help of several spirits.

Even in the short time that I lived alone on the shore of this lake, I had done countless things with the spirits, so I fully understood the possibility.

However, one thing is certain: the man named Malis is clearly a genius of a level that can make one lose one’s mind.

I was trying to emulate his achievement of building a castle in a day, but I could clearly see the difference when I built a two-room cabin in just a week.

What’s more, the fact that the cabin is a crappy wooden building that doesn’t even properly block the rain is an added bonus.

If someone seems to be able to do something very easily, it is evidence that the person has accumulated skills.

From what I experienced and felt for myself, it was clear that the elementalist of the generation before me, Malis, was a genius who had the blueprint for a castle in his head.

Although we are the same spirit magician and have the same last name, Staff, there is a huge difference in level between me and the hero of that history.

It’s almost like the difference between a lizard and a dragon.

At this level, I felt fear, not humility.

I sighed as I looked at the bowl where the rainwater was collecting.

I had a feeling that it would probably get colder after this rain stopped.

I could somehow create something like a building or a desk, but I couldn’t imitate fabric like clothes or mechanical devices like a furnace, so I couldn’t help but tremble.

Even though it was the first house I was building, I foolishly forgot to drill the chimney, so I couldn’t start a fire inside the house.

In the end, the only means of heating I had was a flaming fox, currently curled up next to me, sleeping with its tail in its wake.

But that fox wasn’t really a flame spirit.

All I can do is ignite the fox-shaped spirit’s body by burning my magical power in real time, but due to the cold weather, since I keep it by my side in that form all the time, I naturally create the magic character for fire. He named it Pia after her.

I stretched out my hand toward Pia and thawed my cold fingers.

“… It seems like the house was built unnecessarily wide and only causes more cold winds to blow.”

Although it was a small cabin, it had one more room than the cabin where Sylvia and I lived before.

It was partially built that way.

It was thought that there should be a storage room for her, or a room for her clothes, in case she lives with Sylvia.

Of course, before thinking like that, it would have been nice to first consider a chimney, a furnace, or at least a strong roof that wouldn’t leak.

Moreover, the doors had not been put together yet, so it was essentially one large space.

Thanks to this, the cold wind that came in through the window blew through the entire house.

Of course, I didn’t have the skills to make glass, so the window was left open.

In fact, when Sylvia came to visit, she also planned to repair various places together.

However,

“…When is he coming?”

Ms. Sylvia did not appear.

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As the rain stopped, the temperature dropped significantly as expected and began to hit the forest.

Astonished by the green woman’s words that a hero would come soon, more than a month had already passed since I stayed at this lakeside.

Autumn passed quickly in just one month, and now her breath was slowly starting to come out of her mouth.

In the meantime, we could get our meals from plants or fruits that grew around the lake, but as winter approached, it was clear that even that would not be easy.

The windows were blocked with wide wooden boards, and the floor was torn out in the middle of the living room to create a small fireplace.

As winter approaches, it will not be easy to find firewood, so I had to prepare in advance.

I kept getting anxious.

Sylvia still did not appear.

“…”

The cliché that people talk to themselves when they live alone can be seen in many literary works, but in my case, the amount of talking to myself actually decreased.

Except for Pia, there was no one to talk to, so in the end, the amount of words just decreased.

To add a little lie, I was close to forgetting my own voice.

But even so, the voice of her anxiously waiting voice was still vivid in my ears.

Today again, I was quietly going through the daily routine that I had become accustomed to.

My daily routine included testing how far I could go outside the lake with Pia, finding and drying wood to use as firewood during the winter, and fishing in the lake while looking at the tree that used to be the Green Lady. .

There wasn’t anything particularly difficult, but the most difficult task was getting wood.

I didn’t even have proper tools like an ax or a saw.

Fortunately, thanks to Pia, I was able to do something.

This guy was a pretty great spirit.

I was still not very good at handling spirits, so it was a waste of my skills.

He could easily kill one or two wolves he happened to encounter, and he also used his mysterious powers to cut down large trees.

The problem was that this little fox spirit had no way of dragging the tree back home, so it was up to me to drag it whining.

Thanks to this, even when I lived with Sylvia, I was suffering from physical labor, something I had never done before.

I had muscle pain all day long, and my knees were sore when I slept that I couldn’t sleep.

Still, if it weren’t for Pia, she might have frozen to death, so even this was very sad.

In addition, having something to do helped to ease my loneliness, so I spent every day busy with Pia by my side, except when I was falling asleep.

I prayed that time would pass quickly.

I eagerly waited for the day when Sylvia would come visit me.

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A green woman who turned into a huge tree.

One day, one of the many branches extending from that large tree suddenly fell.

It was a truly bizarre event, as it was not just a small tip that fell, but a large, thick tree branch that fell as a whole.

Moreover, strangely enough, the tree branch looked as if it had been plucked naturally without being broken or cut somewhere.

The cut surface, which stuck out like a golem’s joint, was so strange that I thought it was some kind of gift from the green woman to me.

Just by looking at this large tree branch, which was much thicker than my arm and a little thinner than my torso, it gave off a mysterious atmosphere that made me guess that it contained some special power.

As she picked it up and felt its heavy weight, it felt like what to do flowed directly into her mind.

I started cutting the tree branches so naturally, as if someone had told me to do so.

Life in the forest lacks everything.

This life was always full of deficiencies and needs, with everything from tools to materials missing, but fortunately, I still had the dagger that Sylvia gave me.

In fact, this dagger, my only tool and weapon, was an excellent tool for woodworking.

When I first picked up this dagger, what I did was not fight, but cut Laila’s mark.

Thanks to the time I spent in the spirit world, I couldn’t remember exactly how long ago it was, but it felt like a long time ago.

If you think about it, weeds may have grown thick on Laila’s grave as well.

I want to go take care of it when my magic energy decreases a bit, but I don’t know if the day will ever come when I have the opportunity.

If I’m with Sylvia, I might be able to go and return.

Because she can dilute the demonic energy to some extent.

“…”

I shook off the distracting thoughts that filled my head.

After struggling with the piece of wood for several days, it was now nearing completion.

If you work a little harder, you might be able to complete it within today.

I put down the dagger, shook my hands, and looked at the piece of wood I was cutting for a moment.

The identity of this object, made by carving the body of a green woman with a knife, was a mask.

I don’t know why, but the moment I grabbed that branch, I knew I had to make this mask.

If there were someone around me, it might seem a little strange that I suddenly came to this conclusion, but I had already experienced it once.

The day I learned the basics of spirit art from her in the spirit world.

The feeling of memories and knowledge flowing directly into her head.

Just like that time, a voice and a method to make a mask using these tree branches naturally flowed into my head.

Is the green woman’s consciousness still sleeping in this tree?

It is said that the death of spirits is different from that of humans.

If the death of a spirit means that it returns to nature with only its physical form changed, it may be the same as having a green woman still by my side.

I looked at the large tree outside the door for a moment and then raised the dagger again.

I wasn’t sure if this tree branch was really her body or if the will to cut off the mask was hers, but I could fully understand why she had to make a ‘mask’.

Because I have a curse that must not be spread.

I don’t know if my demonic energy has faded these days, if I’ve adapted to it, or if it’s because I’ve grown as an elementalist, but in the past few days, I’ve been able to go scouting farther than usual.

Of course, I could still feel my body breaking down in real time if I stayed outside for too long, but it was still painful to even open my eyes. It was much better than before when it was difficult to even breathe.

However, being able to go far away was not necessarily a good thing.

As the scope of my activities gradually expanded, I became extremely sensitive due to the fear that I might be revealed.

The men I met in the forest before flash before my eyes.

I vividly remember the day when my eyes glowed red and I slaughtered them all so vividly that it gave me goosebumps.

To be honest, sometimes I still relive those horrible bloody scenes in my eyes in my dreams.

Despite the cold weather, after having such disturbing dreams, I always woke up with sweat all over my body.

To prevent something like that from happening again, I needed to cover my face.

Of course, I too would go crazy the moment I see another person’s face, but at least if a person with enough skills to come to this forest can keep his cool, he will be able to easily subdue someone like me who has lost his senses.

I had no choice but to believe that.

Actually, I thought I could just stay here and hide without having to make a mask, but honestly, I couldn’t wait any longer.

I wanted to go out to find Sylvia.

Crunchy, crunchy,

Only the sound of the dagger gently cutting the wood echoed in the room.

Compared to when Sylvia first handed me the dagger, the taste of cutting has gotten much worse, and the blade has also become dull.

It was because I did not manage it properly.

She used to keep saying that she needed to clean her weapon every time she used it, but honestly, since I had never handled a sword before and didn’t know much about how to care for a sword, she just neglected it.

On the contrary, considering that even though it is in such bad condition, it cuts much better than an ordinary dagger, this dagger must be an extremely luxury item.

The more I thought about the dagger, the more I felt my longing for Sylvia.

Sylvia, why hasn’t she come to me yet?

Did something happen?

To be honest, no matter how much I knew how to control spirits, I was a very weak being compared to her.

I knew that it was presumptuous of me to worry about Sylvia, but I couldn’t stop her from feeling agitated.

I didn’t want to wait idly.

If she was in danger, I wanted to save her, and even if not, if I could see her a day, or even an hour sooner, I wanted to get to her first.

And, to be really honest,

In a corner of her mind, she is in danger and she is picturing my wonderful self to save her…

The small masculinity in my heart that I thought was now extinct was encouraging my actions.

The image of Sylvia, surprised to see me alive and well, running to me and hugging me, shedding tears of emotion, appeared like a picture in her mind.

For the first time in a long time, almost days, I opened my lips and let out a voice.

“Silvia…”

The mask is complete.

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